1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to the field of education in human subjects, and more specifically to a computer program for training the cognitive and memory processing systems in human subjects.
2. Description of the Related Art
Up to ten percent of humans have some type of language-learning impairments (LLI) resulting from the inability to accurately process short duration acoustic events at the rates that occur in normal speech. Their trouble distinguishing among elements of speech is neurologically based and has far reaching consequences: academic failure, emotional and disciplinary problems, and possibly diminished lifelong achievement and self-image. No bracket of intelligence, race, gender or economic level is immune from this problem.
More specifically, people with LLI have difficulty detecting and identifying sounds that occur simultaneously or in close proximity to each other--a phenomenon known as "masking." Because of masking, people with LLI require sounds that are as much as 45 decibels more intense than the preceding or subsequent masking noise to distinguish and understand them. In addition, people with LLI are consistently poorer at detecting a brief tone presented with a masking noise, particularly when the brief tone is turned on immediately prior to the masking noise. This phenomenon is called "backward masking." Similarly, when the brief tone is turned on immediately after the masking noise a similar decrease in detectability can occur. This phenomenon is called "forward masking". For a tone to be detected by a person with LLI in the presence of a masking noise, the tone must be separated in time or frequency from the masking noise.
One way individuals develop such auditory processing problems is from middle ear infections when they are young and beginning to develop the oral representations of language in the central auditory nervous system. When a child has an ear infection, fluid can build up and block or muffle the sound wave entering the ear causing intermittent hearing loss. Even if the infection doesn't permanently damage the ear, the child's brain doesn't learn to process some sounds because it hasn't heard them accurately before, on a consistent basis. This typically occurs during a critical period of brain development when the brain is building the nerve connections necessary to accurately process acoustic events associated with normal speech. As the child grows up, the nervous system never builds, or rebuilds the connections necessary to properly process normal speech.
Researchers believe that the auditory processing problem is essentially one of timing. Vowel sounds like /a/ and /e/ usually last at least 100 milliseconds and typically have constant frequency content. Consonants, on the other hand, typically have modulated frequency components, and last less than 40 milliseconds. People with LLI cannot process these faster speech elements, especially the hard consonants like /t/, /p/, /d/ and /b/, if they occur either immediately before or after vowels, or if they are located near other consonants. Rather than hearing the individual sounds that make up a particular phoneme, people with LLI integrate closely associated sounds together over time. Since the duration of vowels are typically longer than consonants, the modulated frequency portions of consonants are often lost in the integration, an affect that may also hinder the resolution of the vowel, particularly short duration vowels.
This problem of abnormal temporal integration of acoustic events over time is not limited to people with LLI. Rather, the problem extends to stroke victims who have lost the neurological connections necessary to process speech, as well as to individuals raised in one country, having one set of language phonemes, and attempting to learn the language of another country, having a distinct set of language phonemes. For example, it is known that an individual raised in Japan is not often presented with phonemes similar to the English r's and l's, because those consonants are not common in the Japanese language. Similarly, there are many subtleties in the sounds made by a speaker of Japanese that are difficult to distinguish unless raised in Japan. The phonetic differences between languages are distinctions that must be learned, and are often very difficult. But, they are clearly problems that relate to the temporal processing of short duration acoustic events.
The above described temporal processing deficiency has little if anything to do with intelligence. In fact, some LLI specialists argue that brains choosing this different route by which to absorb and reassemble bits of speech may actually stimulate creative intelligence, but at the expense of speech and reading problems.
Recent studies have shown that if the acoustic events associated with phonemes that are difficult to distinguish, such as /ba/ and /da/, are slowed down, or that the consonant portion of the phonemes are emphasized, that students diagnosed as LLI can accurately distinguish between the phonemes. In addition, if the interval between two complex sounds is lengthened, LLI students are better able to process the sounds distinctly.
Heretofore, the solution to the processing problem has been to place LLI students in extended special education and/or speech therapy training programs that focus on speech recognition and speech production. Or, more commonly, repetitive reading programs, phonic games, or other phonic programs are undertaken. These programs often last for years, with a success rate that is often more closely associated with the skill of the speech and language professional than with the program of study.
In addition to the temporal processing problems discussed above, many individuals have a decreased ability to remember and process logical constructs that are common in language. For example, a simple command such as "place the small red circle inside the large green square", requires an individual to logically associate the adjectives "small" and "red" with the subject "circle", and the adjectives "large" and "green" with the subject "square". The command further requires that the individual manipulate the first subject "circle" by placing it into the second subject "square". Individuals with abnormal cognitive processing, or with abnormal short term memory, become easily confused when presented with such commands.
What is needed is a method and apparatus that allows a subject with abnormal temporal processing to train, or retrain their brain to recognize and distinguish short duration acoustic events that are common in speech. Moreover, what is needed is a program that repetitively trains a subject to distinguish phonemes at a normal rate, by first stretching, and/or emphasizing elements of speech to the point that they are distinguishable, or separating speech elements in time, and then adaptively adjusting the stretching, emphasis and separation of the speech elements to the level of normal speech. The adaptive adjustments should be made so as to encourage the subject to continue with the repetitions, and the number of repetitions should be sufficient to develop the necessary neurological connections for normal temporal processing of speech. Moreover, the program should provide acoustic signals to the brain that are better for phonetic training than normal human speech.
Furthermore, what is needed is an adaptive training method to train individuals to accurately process logical constructs that are common in language. In addition, what is needed is a method to improve an individual's short term memory to allow them to correctly process both simple and complex language constructs.